from the who-didn't-see-that-coming dept

When Zediva launched, we already knew it was going to face a legal fight from the MPAA and the movie studios. The company lets people stream movies they want to see, but tries to get around the legal licensing issues by only streaming directly from internet connected DVD players, playing legitimately acquired DVDs. Their argument is that it's really no different than renting a movie and bringing it to your own DVD player. And, perhaps, the Cablevision ruling in the US on remote DVRs gives them some support for their position. But, there was no way the industry was going to just let this go by without any sort of fight. And, so, the MPAA has now sued the company claiming that it's a "sham," and that Zediva is running an illegal video-on-demand service without the proper licenses. In some ways, this case could also impact the attempts by cloud music players to stream legitimate content without a license as well.

All of these situations -- the remote DVR, the remote DVD and cloud music players -- all involve the entertainment industry demanding extra payments for how you use legitimately purchased content. It's really quite amazing what a stunning sense of entitlement the entertainment industry has here. Even if you've legitimately purchased their content, they want to limit what you can actually do with it unless you pay another licensing fee. It's really quite ridiculous and shows the level of desperation these firms are reaching.